Officials in Switzerland have thrown out a request by the US to extradite director Roman Polanski to face charges stemming from a 1977 incident in which he had sex with a 13-year-old girl.

A spokesperson for the Swiss Justice Ministry said: "The reason for the decision lies in the fact that it was not possible to exclude with the necessary certainty a fault in the US extraditionary request."

Polanski has been under house arrest at his vacation home in Gstaad since he was arrested last September en route to a film festival in Switzerland.